Hey ... theres a very good rule that most.. probably about 80% of us actually of the keepers on this forum have.. and thats that quite a lot of people in petshops couldnt tell a bucket from a brick. I had read into ibd quite alot when i was planning getting my first boa.. Theres quite a big section about it in The Boa Constrictor Manual...kinda scared me aswell. But as long as you buy from people you trust or that are reputable breeders then you can feel pretty safe. I also think that IBD is a lot more common in the usa than over here .. as i havnt heard too much of it here yet. If it makes you feel better set up a quarantine system and be meticulous in the order you feed and clean, that way you will have safe of mind... but i see no reason why you shouldnt get some good quality captive bred snakes.

Hope i helped a wee bit.

cheers

WllcR

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I have been keeping and breeding boas and pythons for the last 10 odd years in the uk and have not encountered any case of ibd in mine or anyone else's collection during this time at all ,, and if one thing most reptile keepers will generally have a consensus on is that cb animals do much better than the wc ones.
also rightly mentioned earlier, wc animals come infested with parasites and god only knows what else ,, I would advice anyone to go for healthy cb animals whenever they want to buy any reptiles if they can , any wc animals added to private collections should be done keeping in mind all the risks involved. also any new animals added to collections should be quarantined and all effort should be made to make sure they are from disease free origins..

It definately sounds crazy to go for entirely wc collection coz one is worried about IBD in my view, but then each to their own.

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Brazilian Rainbow Boa 2:2
Blood Python [ Brongesamai ] 1:1
Jungle X Diamond Python 0:1
Pueblan Milk Snake 1:0
Californian King Snake 0:1
Dogue de Bordeaux 1:1

Wanted : more brazilian rainbows, peruvian rainbows, rosy boas, emerald basin

OK, so you take a ridiculous statistic and start getting all wild caught.... and then have the lot wiped out by PMV instead!!

sorry but this is a ridiculous thread... to encourage the stripping of natural ecosystems of readily available CB species so you can avoid a disease based on a random (and pretty much certainly false) statistic???

if you dont want to take the risk of IBD then dont keep boas plain and simple.

dont bring in a whole load of other diseases and parasites by getting WC...

and i'm not against WC animals by the way.... i have WC, LTC and CF animals in my collection.... i just dont think you should buy WC if you can readily get CB.